Firefighters keep watch as Marcello Di Finizio from northern Italy protests on the dome of St. Peter's Basilica prior to Pope Benedict XVI's general audience in St. Peter's Square at the Vatican Oct. 3. Di Finizio, who scaled the railing of the cupola th e previous evening, was protesting the economic policies of Italy and Europe.

Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY — A 49-year-old Italian man protesting the economic policies of Italy and Europe scaled a fence on top of the dome of St. Peter's Basilica Oct. 2 and remained there the next day as some 20,000 people listened to Pope Benedict XVI deliver his weekly general audience talk.

While many people in the crowd noticed a banner hanging from the dome during the audience, it was impossible to read from the square and almost no one seemed to know a man was up there.

Pope Benedict did not mention the protester, Marcello Di Finizio, during his audience talk.

Di Finizio, who had scaled the fence on the dome in July as well, runs a beachfront business in northern Italy, renting umbrellas and chaise lounges. He has been protesting Italy's plan to obey European Union directives by holding public auctions to distribute licenses to operate such businesses on public beaches.

Shortly after the pope's general audience ended, Catholic News Service reached Di Finizio on his cell phone.

Speaking from the dome, he told CNS: "I'm here to ask for help. Our government, our state, doesn't exist. Sectors of the economy, the beach sector, have been paralyzed for years by government policies.

"I ask for political asylum from the Vatican," he said. "The pope is the highest ethical and moral authority in this country, or at least he should be -- let's hope he still is."

Di Finizio, who was wearing an Italian flag around his neck, said he would not come down until government officials and labor union officials promised to sit down with him and resolve the serious economic issues facing Italians who work in the tourism sector.

The protester said he felt forced to take his protest public in a highly visible fashion.

"I want to live; I like living," he said, but "if they want to kill me, let them do it in front of millions of people."

Di Finizio implied he could be willing to jump from the dome. When others are driven to such desperate measures, he said, "these are not suicides, these are homicides."

When a CNS reporter suggested that his message had been heard and he could come down, Di Finizio laughed and said: "In your country, maybe that would work, but we're in Italy. Here they will slap me on the back, kick me in the rear and not listen anymore."

Then Di Finizio made a request, "Please ask the pope to send up an electrical cable so that my phone battery doesn't go dead and I can keep talking to (all of) you."

Vatican firefighters and police officers remained on the public walkway around the top of St. Peter's dome throughout the night and into Oct. 3 as Di Finizio's protest continued.

Di Finizio had joined a group of tourists going to the top of St. Peter's Basilica at about 5 p.m. Rome time Oct. 2. Security cameras showed him climbing over the 4-foot-high fence, tying a rope around himself and lowering himself down to a large decorative overhang above one of the dome's windows.

He also managed to unfurl and tie down a large banner to the dome that said "Help!" and called for an end to policies that were "butchering society."